News

Radley Farming & Families 1600-2011 Exhibition

Over 300 people visited the exhibition in Radley Village Hall on 16 and 17 July 2011.

The exhibition was opened by Nancy Homewood of Peach Croft Farm - the daughter, wife and mother of a Radley farmer.

More about the exhibition

‘Turbulent Times in the Car Industry’ by David Buckle

Following a talk in September 2010 to Radley History Club entitled ‘Turbulent Times in the Car Industry’, David Buckle was encouraged by fellow Club members to write about his experiences as a production line worker, a shop steward and a full-time union official at the Cowley car works who was involved in local, regional and national negotiations.

The book, Turbulent Times in the Car Industry: Memories of a Trade Union Official at Cowley, Oxford, is the result and is his personal account of important events affecting the car industry during the second half of the 20th century. It also includes memories of his visits to German and Russian car plants in 1978 and 1984 respectively.

David was encouraged to write the book by Katherine Hughes, tutor of the Oxford Searchers Group, who organised a ‘Grassroots Grant’ to help with the cost of its publication.

The book is priced at £4.99 and is available from David Buckle, 1 Stonhouse Crescent, Radley, Abingdon OX14 3AG.

David Buckle MBE is a long-standing Radley resident and was chairman of Radley Parish Council from 1995 to 1997, and again from 1999 to 2003. He was also a county councillor from 1989 to 2001, and served as a magistrate in Abingdon for over 30 years. David was awarded an honorary doctorate from Oxford Brookes University in 2001. Read David’s profile on the university’s website.

'Gone for a Soldier'

Gone for A Soldier tells the men’s story for the first time. Men from Radley patrolled the frontiers of the India and manned the defences of the Khyber Pass. They fought for Kitchener in the Sudan and General Roberts in South Africa. The vast majority of men recorded in the book served and fought on the battlefields of the First World War. Many were wounded and some paid the ultimate price with their lives in the war to end all wars. With the Armistice of 1981 the men returned to Radley and their former lives. What happened next is also revealed.

This book contains profiles of 93 men from Radley who served in the armed forces in the Boer War 1899-1902 and the Great War 1914-18. Sixty-five names in the Great War list are taken from the wooden plaque which hangs at the back of Radley Church and the brass memorial plaque on the north wall of the nave. A further eight names appear on the memorial in Radley College to college servants who were killed in that conflict and other names are taken from a photograph of the Radley Football Team of 1914. For each man, family and pre-service information is given where available, followed by details of war service and life after the war.

Gone for A Soldier: Radley Service Men 1885-1920
ISBN 978184426821-4
September 2010
Hardback edition, 169 pages, packed with colour and black and white images
Price £16 plus £3 postage and packing

Copies of this limited edition book are available direct from the author:
Martin Mawhinney
255 Chells Way, Stevenage, Hertfordshire SG2 0LY
Email: martin.mawwhinney3@ntlworld.com

Stanley Baker (Tel: 01235 530402) can produce a copy of the book for inspection.

Kennington Literary Festival